Madeleine L'engle - Time Quartet 01 - A Wrinkle in Time

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A Wrinkle in Time
Madelein L’Engle
1 Mrs. Whatsit
It was a dark and stormy night.
In her attic bedroom Margaret Murry, wrapped in an old patchwork quilt, sat on the foot of her
bed and watched the trees tossing in the frenzied lashing of the wind. Behind the trees clouds
scudded frantically across the sky. Every few moments the moon ripped through them, creating
wraith- like shadows that raced along the ground.
The house shook.
Wrapped in her quilt, Meg shook.
She wasn't usually afraid of weather. —It's not just the weather, she thought. —It's the
weather on top of everything else. On top of me. On top of Meg Murry doing everything wrong.
School. School was all wrong. She'd been dropped down to the lowest section in her grade. That
morning one of her teachers had said crossly, "Really, Meg, I don't understand how a child with
parents as brilliant as yours are supposed to be can be such a poor student. If you don't manage
to do a little better you'll have to stay back next year."
During lunch she'd rough-housed a little to try to make herself feel better, and one of the
girls said scornfully, "After all, Meg, we aren't grammar-school kids any more. Why do you always
act like such a baby?"
And on the way home from school, walking up the road with her arms full of books, one of the
boys had said something about her "dumb baby brother." At this she'd thrown die books on the side
of the road and tackled him with every ounce of strength she had, and arrived home with her blouse
torn and a big bruise under one eye.
Sandy and Dennys, her ten-year-old twin brothers, who got home from school an hour earlier
than she did, were disgusted. "Let us do the fighting when it's necessary," they told her.
—A delinquent, that's what I am, she thought grimly. — That's what they'll be saying next. Not
Mother. But Them. Everybody Else. I wish Father—
But it was still not possible to think about her father without the danger of tears. Only her
mother could talk about him in a natural way, saying, "When your father gets back—"
Gets back from where? And when? Surely her mother must know what people were saying, must be
aware of the smugly vicious gossip. Surely it must hurt her as it did Meg. But if it did she gave
no outward sign. Nothing ruffled the serenity other expression.
—Why can't I hide it, too? Meg thought. Why do I always have to show everything?
The window rattled madly in the wind, and she pulled the quilt dose about her. Curled up on
one of her pillows a gray fluff of kitten yawned, showing its pink tongue, tucked its head under
again, and went back to sleep.
Everybody was asleep. Everybody except Meg. Even Charles Wallace, the "dumb baby brother," who
had an uncanny way of knowing when she was awake and unhappy, and who would come, so many nights,
tiptoeing up the attic stairs to her—even Charles Wallace was asleep.
How could they sleep? All day on the radio there had been hurricane warnings. How could they
leave her up in the attic in the rickety brass bed, knowing that the roof might be blown right off
the house, and she tossed out into the wild night sky to land who knows where?
Her shivering grew uncontrollable.
—You asked to have the attic bedroom, she told herself savagely. —Mother let you have it
because you're the oldest. It’s a privilege, not a punishment.
"Not during a hurricane, it isn't a privilege," she said aloud. She tossed the quilt down on
the foot of the bed, and stood up. The kitten stretched luxuriously, and looked up at her with
huge, innocent eyes.
"Go back to sleep," Meg said. "Just be glad you're a kitten and not a monster like me." She
looked at herself in the wardrobe mirror and made a horrible face, baring a mouthful of teeth
covered with braces. Automatically she pushed her glasses into position, ran her fingers through
her mouse-brown hair, so that it stood wildly on end, and let out a sigh almost as noisy as the
wind.
The wide wooden floorboards were cold against her feet. Wind blew in the crevices about the
window frame, in spite of the protection the storm sash was supposed to offer. She could hear wind
howling in the chimneys. From all the way downstairs she could hear Fortinbras, the big black dog,
starting to bark. He must be frightened, too. What was he barking at? Fortinbras never barked
without reason.
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Suddenly she remembered that when she had gone to the post office to pick up the mail she'd
heard about a tramp who was supposed to have stolen twelve sheets from Mrs. Buncombe, the
constable's wife. They hadn't caught him, and maybe he was heading for the Murry's house right
now, isolated on a back road as it was; and this time maybe he'd be after more than sheets. Meg
hadn't paid much attention to the talk about the tramp at the time, because the postmistress, with
a sugary smile, had asked if she'd heard from her father lately.
She left her little room and made her way through the shadows of the main attic, bumping
against the ping-pong table. —Now I'll have a bruise on my hip on top of everything else, she
thought.
Next she walked into her old dolls' house, Charles Wallace's rocking horse, the twins'
electric trains. "Why must everything happen to me?" She demanded of a large teddy bear.
At the foot of the attic stairs she stood still and listened. Not a sound from Charles
Wallace's room on the right. On the left, in her parents' room, not a rustle from her mother
sleeping alone in the great double bed. She tiptoed down the hall and into the twins' room,
pushing again at her glasses as though they could help her to see better in the dark. Dennys was
snoring. Sandy murmured something about baseball and subsided. The twins didn't have any problems.
They weren't great students, but they weren't bad ones, either. They were perfectly content with a
succession of B's and an occasional A or C. They were strong and fast runners and good at games,
and when cracks were made about anybody in the Murry family, they weren't made about Sandy and
Dennys.
She left the twins' room and went on downstairs, avoiding the creaking seventh step.
Fortinbras had stopped barking. It wasn't the tramp this time, then. Fort would go On barking if
anybody was around.
—But suppose the tramp does come? Suppose he has a knife? Nobody lives near enough to hear if
we screamed and screamed and screamed. Nobody'd care, anyhow.
—I’ll make myself some cocoa, she decided. —That'll cheer me up, and if the roof blows off at
least I won't go off with it.
In the kitchen a light was already on, and Charles Wallace was sitting at the table drinking
milk and eating bread and jam. He looked very small and vulnerable sitting there alone in the big
old-fashioned kitchen, a blond little boy in faded blue Dr. Dentons, his feet swinging a good six
inches above the floor.
"Hi," he said cheerfully. "I've been waiting for you."
From under the table where he was lying at Charles Wallace's feet, hoping for a crumb or two,
Fortinbras raised his slender dark head in greeting to Meg, and his tail thumped against the
floor. Fortinbras had arrived on their doorstep, a half-grown puppy, scrawny and abandoned, one
winter night. He was, Meg's father had decided, part Uewellyn setter and part greyhound, and he
had a slender^ dark beauty that was all his own.
"Why didn't you come up to the attic?" Meg asked her brother, speaking as though he were at
least her own age. "I've been scared stiff."
"Too windy up in that attic of yours," the little boy said. "I knew you'd be down. I put some
milk on the stove for you. It ought to be hot by now."
How did Charles Wallace always know about her? How could he always tell? He never knew—or
seemed to care— what Dennys or Sandy were thinking. It was his mother's mind, and Meg's, that he
probed with frightening accuracy.
Was it because people were a little afraid of him that they whispered about the Murry's
youngest child, who was rumored to be not quite bright? "I've heard that clever people often have
subnormal children," Meg had once overheard. "The two boys seem to be nice, regular children, but
that unattractive girl and the baby boy certainly aren't all there.”
It was true that Charles Wallace seldom spoke when anybody was around, so that many people
thought he'd never learned to talk. And it was true that he hadn't talked at all until he was
almost four. Meg would turn white with fury when people looked at him and clucked, shaking their
heads sadly.
"Don't worry about Charles Wallace, Meg." her father had once told her. Meg remembered it very
clearly because it was shortly before he went away. "There's nothing the matter with his mind. He
just does things in his own way and in his own time.”
"I don't want him to grow up to be dumb like me," Meg had said.
"Oh, my darling, you're not dumb," her father answered. "You're like Charles Wallace. Your
development has to go at its own pace. It just doesn't happen to be the usual pace."
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"How do you know?” Meg had demanded. "How do you know I'm not dumb? Isn't it just because you
love me?"
"I love you, but that's not what tells me. Mother and I've given you a number of tests, you
know."
Yes, that was true. Meg had realized that some of the "games" her parents played with her
were tests of some kind, and that there had been more for her and Charles Wallace than for the
twins. "IQ tests, you mean?"
"Yes, some of them."
"Is my IQ okay?"
"More than okay."
"What is it?"
"That I'm not going to tell you. But it assures me that both you and Charles Wallace will be
able to do pretty much whatever you like when you grow up to yourselves. You just wait till
Charles Wallace starts to talk. You'll see."
How right he had been about that, though he himself had left before Charles Wallace began to
speak, suddenly, with none of the usual baby preliminaries, using entire sentences. How proud he
would have been!
"You'd better check the milk," Charles Wallace said to Meg now, his diction clearer and
cleaner than that of most five-year-olds. "You know you don't like it when it gets a skin on top."
"You put in more than twice enough milk." Meg peered into the saucepan.
Charles Wallace nodded serenely. "I thought Mother might like some."
"I might like what?" a voice said, and there was their mother standing in the doorway.
"Cocoa," Charles Wallace said. "Would you like a liver- wurst-and-cream-cheese sandwich? I’ll
be happy to make you one."
That would be lovely," Mrs. Murry said, "but I can make it myself if you're busy."
"No trouble at all." Charles Wallace slid down from his chair and trotted over to the
refrigerator, his pajamaed feet padding softly as a kitten's. "How about you, Meg?" he asked.
"Sandwich?"
"Yes, please," she said. "But not liverwurst. Do we have any tomatoes?"
Charles Wallace peered into the crisper. "One. All right if I use it on Meg, Mother?"
"To what better use could it be put?" Mrs. Murry smiled. "But not so loud, please, Charles.
That is, unless you want the twins downstairs, too."
"Let’s be exclusive," Charles Wallace said. "That's my new word for the day. Impressive, isn't
it?"
"Prodigious," Mrs. Murry said. "Meg, come let me look at that bruise."
Meg knelt at her mother's feet. The warmth and light of the kitchen had relaxed her so that
her attic fears were gone. The cocoa steamed fragrantly in the saucepan; geraniums bloomed on the
window sills and there was a bouquet of tiny yellow chrysanthemums in the center of the table. The
curtains, red, with a blue and green geometrical pattern, were drawn, and seemed to reflect their
cheerfulness throughout the room. The furnace purred like a great, sleepy animal; the lights
glowed with steady radiance; outside, alone in the dark, the wind still battered against the
house, but the angry power that had frightened Meg while she was alone in the attic was subdued by
the familiar comfort of the kitchen. Underneath Mrs. Murry's chair Fortinbras let out a contented
sigh.
Mrs. Murry gently touched Meg's bruised cheek. Meg looked up at her mother, half in loving
admiration, half in sullen resentment. It was not an advantage to have a mother who was a
scientist and a beauty as well. Mrs. Murry's flaming red hair, creamy skin, and violet eyes with
long dark lashes, seemed even more spectacular in comparison with Meg's outrageous plainness.
Meg's hair had been passable as long as she wore it tidily in braids. When she went into high
school it was cut, and now she and her mother struggled with putting it up, but one side would
come out curly and the other straight, so that she looked even plainer than before.
"You don't know the meaning of moderation, do you, my darling?" Mrs. Murry asked. "A happy
medium is something I wonder if you'll ever learn. That's a nasty bruise the Henderson boy gave
you. By the way, shortly after you'd gone to bed his mother called up to complain about how badly
you'd hurt him. I told her that since he's a year older and at least twenty-five pounds heavier
than you are, I thought I was the one who ought to be doing the complaining. But she seemed to
think it was all your fault."
"I suppose that depends on how you look at it," Meg said. "Usually no matter what happens
people think it's my fault, even if I have nothing to do with it at all. But I'm sorry I tried to
fight him. It's just been an awful week. And I'm full of bad feeling."
Mrs. Murry stroked Meg's shaggy head. "Do you know why?"
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"I hate being an oddball," Meg said. "It's hard on Sandy and Dennys, too. I don't know if
they're really like everybody else, or if they're just able to pretend they are. I try to pretend,
but it isn't any help."
"You're much too straightforward to be able to pretend to be what you aren't," Mrs. Murry
said. "I'm sorry, Meglet. Maybe if Father were here he could help you, but I don't think I can do
anything till you've managed to plow through some more time. Then things will be easier for you.
But that isn't much help right now, is it?"
"Maybe if I weren't so repulsive-looking—maybe if I were pretty like you—"
"Mother's not a bit pretty; she's beautiful," Charles Wallace announced, slicing liverwurst.
"Therefore I bet she was awful at your age."
"How right you are," Mrs. Murry said. "Just give yourself time, Meg." ^
"Lettuce on your sandwich. Mother?" Charles Wallace asked.
"No. thanks."
He cut the sandwich into sections, put it on a plate, and set it in front of his mother.
"Yours’ll be along in just a minute, Meg. I think I'll talk to Mrs. Whatsit about you."
"Who's Mrs. Whatsit?" Meg asked.
"I think I want to be exclusive about her for a while," Charles Wallace said, "Onion salt?"
"Yes, please."
"What's Mrs. Whatsit stand for?" Mrs. Murry asked.
"That's her name," Charles Wallace answered. "You know the old shingled house back in the
woods that the kids won't go near because they say it's haunted? That's where they live."
"They?"
"Mrs. Whatsit and her two friends. I was out with Fortinbras a couple of days ago—you and the
twins were at school, Meg. We like to walk in the woods, and suddenly he took off after a squirrel
and I took off after him and we ended up by the haunted house, so I met them by accident, as you
might say."
"But nobody lives there," Meg said.
"Mrs. Whatsit and her friends do. They've very enjoyable."
"Why didn't you tell me about it before?" Mrs. Murry asked. "And you know you're not supposed
to go off our property without permission, Charles."
"I know," Charles said. "That's one reason I didn't tell you. I Just rushed off after
Fortinbras without thinking. And then I decided, well, I'd better save them for an emergency,
anyhow."
A fresh gust of wind took the house and shook it, and suddenly the rain began to lash against
the windows.
"I don't think I like this wind," Meg said nervously.
"Well lose some shingles off the roof, that's certain," Mrs. Murry said. "But this house has
stood for almost two hundred years and I think it will last a little longer, Meg. There's been
many a high wind up on this hill."
"But this is a hurricane!" Meg wailed. "The radio kept saying it was a hurricane!"
"It's October," Mrs. Murry told her. "There've been storms in October before."
As Charles Wallace gave Meg her sandwich Fortinbras came out from under the table. He gave a
long, low growl, and they could see the dark fur slowly rising on his back. Meg felt her own skin
prickle.
"What's wrong?" she asked anxiously.
Fortinbras stared at the door that opened into Mrs. Murry's laboratory which was in the old stone
dairy right off the kitchen. Beyond the lab a pantry led outdoors, though Mrs. Murry had done her
best to train the family to come into the house through the garage door or the front door and not
through her lab. But it was the lab door and not the garage door toward which Fortinbras was
growling.
"You didn't leave' any nasty-smelling chemicals cooking over a Bunsen burner, did you,
Mother?" Charles Wallace asked.
Mrs. Murray stood up. "No. But I think I'd better go see what's upsetting Fort, anyhow."
"It's the tramp, I'm sure it's the tramp," Meg said nervously.
"What tramp?" Charles Wallace asked.
"They were saying at the post office this afternoon that a tramp stole all Mrs. Buncombe's
sheets."
"We'd better sit on the pillow cases, then," Mrs. Murry said lightly. "I don't think even a
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tramp would be out on a night like this, Meg."
"But that's probably why he is out," Meg wailed, "trying to find a place not to be out."
"In which case I’ll offer him the barn till morning." Mrs. Murry went briskly to the door.
"I'll go with you." Meg's voice was shrill.
"No, Meg, you stay with Charles and eat your sandwich."
"Eat!" Meg exclaimed as Mrs. Murry went out through the lab. "How does she expect me to eat?"
"Mother can take care of herself," Charles said. "Physically, that is." But he sat in his
father's chair at the table and his legs kicked at the rungs; and Charles Wallace, unlike most
small children, had the ability to sit still.
After a few moments that seemed like forever to Meg, Mrs. Murry came back in, holding the door
open for—was it the tramp? It seemed small for Meg's idea of a tramp. The age or sex was
impossible to tell, for it was completely bundled up in clothes. Several scarves of assorted
colors were tied about the head, and a man's felt hat perched atop. A shocking pink stole was
knotted about a rough overcoat, and black rubber boots covered the feet.
"Mrs. Whatsit," Charles said suspiciously, "what are you doing here? And at this time of
night, too?"
"Now don't you be worried, my honey." A voice emerged from among turned-up coat collar, stole,
scarves, and hat, a voice like an unoiled gate, but somehow not unpleasant.
"Mrs.—uh—Whatsit—says she lost her way," Mrs. Murry said. "Would you care for some hot
chocolate, Mrs. Whatsit?"
"Charmed, I'm sure," Mrs. Whatsit answered, taking off the hat and die stole. "It isn't so
much that I lost my way as that I got blown off course. And when I realized that I was at little
Charles Wallace's house I thought I'd just come in and rest a bit before proceeding on my way."
"How did you know this was Charles Wallace's house?" Meg asked.
"By the smell." Mrs. Whatsit untied a blue and green paisley scarf, a red and yellow flowered
print, a gold Liberty print, a red and black bandanna. Under all this a sparse quantity of grayish
hair was tied in a small but tidy knot on top of her head. Her eyes were bright, her nose a round,
soft blob, her mouth puckered like an autumn apple. "My, but it's lovely and warm in here," she
said.
"Do sit down." Mrs. Murry indicated a chair. "Would you like a sandwich, Mrs. Whatsit? I've
had liverwurst and cream cheese; Charles has had bread and jam; and Meg, lettuce and tomato."
"Now, let me see," Mrs. Whatsit pondered. "I'm passionately fond of Russian caviar."
"You peeked!" Charles cried indignantly. "We're saving that for Mother's birthday and you
can't have any!"
Mrs. Whatsit gave a deep and pathetic sigh.
"No," Charles said. "Now, you mustn't give in to her, Mother, or I shall be very angry. How
about tuna-fish salad?"
"All right," Mrs. Whatsit said meekly.
"Ill fix it," Meg offered, going to the pantry for a can of tuna fish.
—For crying out loud, she thought, —this old woman comes barging in on us in the middle of the
night and Mother takes it as though there weren't anything peculiar about it at all. I'll bet she
is the tramp. Ill bet she did steal those sheets. And she's certainly no one Charles Wallace ought
to be friends with, especially when he won't even talk to ordinary people.
"I've only been in the neighborhood a short time," Mrs. Whatsit was saying as Meg switched off
the pantry light and came back into the kitchen with the tuna fish, "and I didn't think I was
going to like the neighbors at all until dear little Charles came over with his dog."
"Mrs. Whatsit," Charles Wallace demanded severely, "why did you take Mrs. Buncombe's sheets?"
"Well, I needed them, Charles dear."
"You must return them at once."
"But Charles, dear, I can't. I've used them."
"It was very wrong of you," Charles Wallace scolded. "If you needed sheets that badly you
should have asked me.
Mrs. Whatsit shook her head and clucked. "You can't spare any sheets. Mrs. Buncombe can."
Meg cut up some celery and mixed it in with the tuna. After a moment's hesitation she opened
the refrigerator door and brought out a jar of little sweet pickles. —Though why I'm doing it for
her I don't know, she thought, as she cut them up. —I don't trust her one bit.
"Tell your sister I'm all right," Mrs. Whatsit said to Charles. "Tell her my intentions are
good."
"The road to hell is paved with good intentions," Charles intoned.
"My, but isn't he cunning." Mrs. Whatsit beamed at him fondly. "It's lucky he has someone to
understand him."
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"But I'm afraid he doesn't," Mrs. Murry said. "None of us is quite up to Charles."
"But at least you aren't trying to squash him down." Mrs. Whatsit nodded her head vigorously.
"You're letting him be himself."
"Here's your sandwich," Meg said, bringing it to Mrs. Whatsit.
"Do you mind if I take off my boots before I eat?" Mrs. Whatsit asked, picking up the sandwich
nevertheless. "Listen." She moved her feet up and down in her boots, and they could hear water
squelching. "My toes are ever so damp. The trouble is that these boots arc a mite too tight for
me, and I never can take them off by myself."
Ill help you," Charles offered.
"Not you. You're not strong enough."
Ill help." Mrs. Murry squatted at Mrs. Whatsit’s feet, yanking on one slick boot. When the
boot came off it came suddenly. Mrs. Murry sat down with a thump. Mrs. Whatsit went tumbling
backward with the chair onto the floor, sandwich held high in one old claw. Water poured out of
the boot and ran over the floor and the big braided rug.
"Oh, dearie me," Mrs. Whatsit said, lying on her back in the overturned chair, her feet in the
air, one in a red and white striped sock, the other still booted.
Mrs. Murry got to her feet. "Are you all right, Mrs. Whatsit?"
"If you have some liniment I'll put it on my dignity," Mrs. Whatsit said, still supine. "I
think it's sprained. A little oil of cloves mixed well with garlic is rather good." And she took a
large hite of sandwich.
“Do please get up," Charles said. "I don't like to see you lying there that way. You're
carrying things too far."
"Have you ever tried to get to your feet with a sprained dignity?" But Mrs. Whatsit scrambled
up, righted the chair, and then sat back down on the floor, the booted foot stuck out in front of
her, and took another bite. She moved with great agility for such an old woman. At least Meg was
reasonably sure that she was an old woman, and a very old woman at that.
Mrs. Whatsit, her mouth full, ordered Mrs. Murry, "Now pull while I'm already down.”
Quite calmly, as though this old woman and her boots were nothing out of the ordinary, Mrs.
Murry pulled until the second boot relinquished the foot This foot was covered with a blue and
gray Argyle sock. and Mrs. Whatsit sat there, wriggling her toes, contentedly finishing her
sandwich before scrambling to her feet. "Ah," she said, "that's ever so much better," and took
both boots and shook them out over the sink. "My stomach is full and I'm warm inside and out and
it's time I went home."
"Don't you think you'd better stay till morning?" Mrs. Murry asked.
"Oh, thank you, dearie, but there's so much to do I just can't waste time sitting around
frivoling."
"It's much too wild a night to travel in."
"Wild nights are my glory," Mrs. Whatsit said. "I just got caught in a down draft and blown
off course."
"Well, at least till your socks are dry—"
"Wet socks don't bother me. I just didn't like the water squishing around in my boots. Now
don't worry about me, lamb." (Lamb was not a word one would ordinarily think of calling Mrs.
Murry.) "I shall just sit down for a moment and pop on my boots and then I’ll be on my way.
Speaking of ways, pet, by the way. there is such a thing as a tesseract."
Mrs. Murry went very white and with one hand reached backward and clutched at a chair for
support. Her voice trembled. "What did you say?"
Mrs. Whatsit tugged at her second boot. "'I said," she grunted, shoving her foot down in,
"that there is"—shove —"such a thing"—shove—"as a tesseract." Her foot went down into the boot,
and grabbing shawls, scarves, and hat, she hustled out the door. Mrs. Murry stayed very still,
making no move to help the old woman. As the door opened, Fortinbras streaked in, panting, wet and
shiny as a seal. He looked at Mrs. Murry and whined.
The door slammed.
"Mother, what's the matter!" Meg cried "What did she say? What is it?"
"The tesseract—" Mrs. Murry whispered. "What did she mean? How could she have known?"
2 Mrs. Who
WHEN Meg woke to the jangling of her alarm clock the wind was still blowing but the sun was
shining; the worst of the storm was over. She sat up in bed, shaking her head to clear it.
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It must have been a dream. She'd been frightened by the storm and worried about the tramp so
she'd just dreamed about going down to the kitchen and seeing Mrs, Whatsit and having her mother
get all frightened and upset by that word—what was it? Tess—tess something.
She dressed hurriedly, picked up the kitten still curled up on the bed, and dumped it
unceremoniously on the floor. The kitten yawned, stretched, gave a piteous miaow, trotted out of
the attic and down the stairs. Meg made her bed and hurried after it. In the kitchen her mother
was making French toast and the twins were already at the table. The kitten was lapping milk out
of a saucer.
"Where's Charles?" Meg asked.
"Still asleep. We had rather an interrupted night, if you remember."
"I hoped it was a dream," Meg said.
Her mother carefully turned over four slices of French toast, then said in a steady voice,
"No, Meg. Don't hope it was a dream. I don't understand it any more than you do, but one thing
I've learned is that you don't have to understand things for them to be. I'm sorry I showed you I
was upset. Your father and I used to have a joke about tesseract.”
"What is a tesseract?" Meg asked.
"It's a concept." Mrs. Murry handed the twins the syrup. "I’ll try to explain it to you later.
There isn't time before school."
"I don't see why you didn't wake us up," Dennys said. "It’s a gyp we missed out on all the
fun."
"You’ll be a lot more awake in school today than I will." Meg took her French toast to the
table.
"Who cares," Sandy said. "If you're going to let old tramps come into the house in the middle
of the night, Mother, you ought to have Den and me around to protect you."
"After all. Father would expect us to," Dennys added.
"We know you have a great mind and all. Mother,"
Sandy said, "but you don't have much sense. And certainly Meg and Charles don't."
"I know. We're morons." Meg was bitter.
"I wish you wouldn't be such a dope, Meg. Syrup, please." Sandy reached across the table. "You
don't have to take everything so personally. Use a happy medium, for heaven's sake. You just goof
around in school and look out the window and don't pay any attention."
"You just make things harder for yourself," Dennys said. "And Charles Wallace is going to have
an awful time next year when he starts school. We know he's bright, but he's so funny when he's
around other people, and they're so used to thinking he's dumb, I don't know what's going to
happen to him. Sandy and I’ll sock anybody who picks on him, but that's about all we can do."
"Let's not worry about next year till we get through this one," Mrs. Murry said. "More French
toast, boys?"
At school Meg was tired and her eyelids sagged and her mind wandered. In social studies she
was asked to name the principal imports and exports of Nicaragua, and though Slie had looked them
up dutifully the evening before, now she could remember none of them. The teacher was sarcastic,
the rest of the class laughed, and she flung herself down in her seat in a fury. "Who cares about
the imports and exports of Nicaragua, anyhow?" she muttered.
"If you're going to be rude, Margaret, you may leave the room," the teacher said.
"Okay, I will." Meg flounced out.
During study hall the principal sent for her. "What seems to be the problem now, Meg?" he
asked, pleasantly enough.
Meg looked sulkily down at the floor. "Nothing, Mr. Jenkins."
"Miss Porter tells me you were inexcusably rude."
Meg shrugged.
"Don't you realize that you just make everything harder for yourself by your attitude?" the
principal asked. "Now, Meg, I'm convinced that you can do the work and keep up with your grade if
you will apply yourself, but some of your teachers are not. You're going to have to do something
about yourself. Nobody can do it tor you." Meg was silent. "Well? What about it, Meg?"
“I don't know what to do," Meg said.
"You could do your homework, for one thing. Wouldn't your mother help you?"
"If I asked her to."
"Meg, is something troubling you? Are you unhappy at home?" Mr. Jenkins asked.
At last Meg looked at him, pushing at her glasses in a characteristic gesture. "Everything's
fine at home."
"I'm glad to hear it. But I know it must be hard on you to have your father away."
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Meg eyed the principal warily, and ran her tongue over the barbed line of her braces.
"Have you had any news from him lately?"
Meg was sure it was not only imagination that made her feel that behind Mr. Jenkins' surface
concern was a gleam of avid curiosity. Wouldn't he like to know! she thought. And if I knew
anything he's the last person I'd tell. Well, one of the last.
The postmistress must know that it was almost a year now since the last letter, and heaven
knows how many people she'd told, or what unkind guesses she'd made about the reason for the long
silence.
Mr. Jenkins waited for an answer, but Meg only shrugged.
"Just what was your father's line of business?" Mr. Jenkins asked. "Some kind of scientist,
wasn't he?"
"He is a physicist.” Meg bared her teeth to reveal the two ferocious lines of braces.
"Meg, don't you think you'd make a better adjustment to life if you faced facts?"
"I do face facts," Meg said. "They're lots easier to face than people, I can tell you."
'Then why don't you face facts about your father?"
"You leave my father out of it!" Meg shouted.
"Stop bellowing." Mr. Jenkins said sharply. "Do you want the entire school to hear you?"
"So what?" Meg demanded. "I'm not ashamed of anything I'm saying. Are you?"
Mr. Jenkins sighed. "Do you enjoy being the most belligerent, uncooperative child in school?"
Meg ignored this. She leaned over the desk toward the principal. "Mr. Jenkins, you've met my
mother, haven't you? You can't accuse her of not facing facts, can you? She's a scientist. She has
doctors' degrees in both biology and bacteriology. Her business is facts. When she tells me that
my father isn't coming home, I'll believe it. As long as she says Father is coming home, then I’ll
believe that."
Mr. Jenkins sighed again. "No doubt your mother wants to believe that your father is coming
home, Meg. Very well, I can't do anything else with you. Go on back to study hall. Try to be a
little less antagonistic. Maybe your work would improve if your general attitude were more
tractable."
When Meg got home from school her mother was in the lab, the twins were at Little League, and
Charles Wallace, the kitten, and Fortinbras were waiting tor her. Fortinbras jumped up, put his
front paws on her shoulders, and gave her a kiss, and the kitten rushed to his empty, saucer and
mewed loudly.
"Come on," Charles Wallace said. "Let's go."
"Where?" Meg asked. I’m hungry, Charles. I don't want to go anywhere till I've had something
to eat" She was still sore from the interview with Mr. Jenkins, and her voice sounded cross.
Charles Wallace looked at her thoughtfully as she went to the refrigerator and gave the kitten
some milk, then drank a mugful herself.
He handed her a paper bag. "Here's a sandwich and some cookies and an apple. I thought we'd
better go see Mrs. Whatsit."
"Oh, golly," Meg said. "Why, Charles?"
"You're still uneasy about her, aren't you?" Charles asked.
"Well, yes."
"Don't be. She's all right. I promise you. She's on our side."
"How do you know?"
"Meg," he said impatiently. "I know."
"But why should we go see her now?"
"I want to find out more about that tesseract thing. Didn't you see how it upset Mother? You
know when Mother can't control the way she feels, when she lets us see she's upset, then it's
something big."
Meg thought for a moment. "Okay, let's go. But let's take Fortinbras with us."
"Well, of course. He needs the exercise."
They set off, Fortinbras rushing ahead, then doubling back to the two children, then leaping
off again. The Murrys lived about four miles out of the village. Behind the house was a pine woods
and it was through this that Charles Wallace took Meg.
"Charles, you know she's going to get in awful trouble— Mrs. Whatsit, I mean—if they find out
she's broken into the haunted house. And taking Mrs. Buncombe's sheets and everything. They could
send her to jail."
"One of the reasons I want to go over this afternoon is to warn them."
“Them?"
"I told you she was there with her two friends. I'm not even sure it was Mrs. Whatsit herself
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who took die sheets, though I wouldn't put it past her." "But what would she want all those sheets
for?" "I intend to ask her," Charles Wallace said, "and to tell them they'd better be more
careful. I don't really think they'll let anybody find them, but I just thought we ought to
mention the possibility. Sometimes during vacations some of the boys go out there looking for
thrills, but I don't think anybody's apt to right now, what with basketball and everything."
They walked in silence for a moment through die fragrant woods, the rusty pine needles gentle
under their feet. Up above them the wind made music in the branches.
Charles Wallace slipped his hand confidingly in Meg's, and {he sweet, little-boy gesture
warmed her so that she felt the tense knot inside her begin to loosen. Charles loves me at any
rate, she thought.
"School awful again today?" he asked after a while.
“Yes. I got sent to Mr. Jenkins. He made snide remarks about Father."
Charles Wallace nodded sagely. "I know."
"How do you know?"
Charles Wallace shook his head. "I can't quite explain. You tell me, that's all."
"But I never say anything. You just seem to know." ^Everything about you tells me," Charles
said. “How about the twins?" Meg asked. "Do you know about them, too?"
"I suppose I could if I wanted to. If they needed me. But it's sort of tiring, so I just
concentrate on you and Mother."
"You mean you read our minds?"
Charles Wallace looked troubled. "I don't think it's that. It's being able to understand a
sort of language, like sometimes if I concentrate very hard I can understand the wind talking with
the trees. You tell me, you see, sort of inadvertently. That's a good word, isn't it? I got Mother
to look it up in the dictionary for me this morning. I really must learn to read except I'm afraid
it will make it awfully hard for me in school next year if I already know things. I think it will
be better if people go on thinking I'm not very bright. They won't hate me quite so much."
Ahead of them Fortinbras started barking loudly, the warning bay that usually told them that a car
was coming up the road or that someone was at the door.
"Somebody's here," Charles Wallace said sharply. "Somebody's hanging around the house. Come
on." He started to run, his short legs straining. At the edge of the woods Fortinbras stood in
front of a boy, barking furiously.
As they came panting up the boy said, "For crying out loud, call off your dog."
"Who is he?" Charles Wallace asked Meg.
"Calvin O'Keefe. He's in Regional, but he's older than I am. He's a big bug."
"It's all right, fella. I'm not going to hurt you," the boy said to Fortinbras.
"Sit, Fort," Charles Wallace commanded, and Fortinbras dropped to his haunches in front of the
boy, a low growl still pulsing in his dark throat.
"Okay." Charles Wallace put his hands on his hips. "Now tell us what you're doing here."
"I might ask the same of you," the boy said with some indignation. "Aren't you two of the
Murry kids? This isn't your property, is it?" He started to move, but Fortinbras' growl grew
louder and he stopped.
"Tell me about him, Meg," Charles Wallace demanded.
"What would I know about him?" Meg asked. "He's a couple of grades above me, and he's on the
basketball team."
"Just because I'm tall." Calvin sounded a little embarrassed. Tall he certainly was, and
skinny. His bony wrists stuck out of the sleeves of his blue sweater; his worn corduroy trousers
were three inches too short. He had orange hair that needed cutting and the appropriate freckles
to go with it. His eyes were an oddly bright blue.
"Tell us what you're doing here," Charles Wallace said.
"What is this? The third degree? Aren't you the one who's supposed to be the moron?"
Meg flushed with rage, but Charles Wallace answered placidly, "That's right. If you want me to
call my dog off you'd better give."
"Most peculiar moron I've ever met," Calvin said. "I just came to get away from my family."
Charles Wallace nodded. "What kind of family?"
"They all have runny noses. I'm third from the top of eleven kids. I'm a sport"
At that Charles Wallace grinned widely, "So'm I."
"I don't mean like in baseball," Calvin said.
"Neither do I."
"I mean like in biology," Calvin said suspiciously.
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"A change in gene," Charles Wallace quoted, "resulting in the appearance in the offspring of a
character which is not present in the parents but which is potentially transmissible to its
offspring."
“What gives around here?" Calvin asked. "I was told you couldn't talk."
"Thinking I'm a moron gives people something to feel smug about," Charles Wallace said. "Why
should I disillusion them? How old are you, Cal?"
"Fourteen."
"What grade?"
"Junior. Eleventh. I'm bright Listen, did anybody ask you to come here this afternoon?"
Charles Wallace, holding Fort by the collar, looked at Calvin suspiciously. "What do you mean,
asked?"
Calvin shrugged. "You still don't trust me, do you?"
"I don't distrust you," Charles Wallace said.
"Do you want to tell me why you're here, then?"
"Fort and Meg and I decided to go for a walk. We often do in the afternoon."
Calvin dug his hands down in his pockets. "You're holding out on me.”
"So're you," Charles Wallace said.
"Okay, old sport," Calvin said, "I'll tell you this much. Sometimes I get a feeling about
things. You might call it a compulsion. Do you know what compulsion means?"
"Constraint. Obligation. Because one is compelled. Not a very good definition, but it's the
Concise Oxford."
"Okay, okay," Calvin sighed. "I must remember I'm preconditioned in my concept of your
mentality."
Meg sat down on die coarse grass at the edge of the woods. Fort gently twisted his collar out
of Charles Wallace's hands and came over to Meg, lying down beside her and putting his head in her
lap.
Calvin tried now politely to direct his words toward Meg as well as Charles Wallace, "When I
get this feeling, this compulsion, I always do what it tells me. I can't explain where it comes
from or how I get it, and it doesn't happen very often. But I obey it. And this afternoon I had a
feeling that I must come over to the haunted house. That's all I know, kid. I'm not holding
anything back. Maybe it's because I'm supposed to meet you. You tell me."
Charles Wallace looked at Calvin probingly for a moment; then an almost glazed look came into
his eyes, and he seemed to be thinking at him. Calvin stood very still, and waited.
At last Charles Wallace said. "Okay. I believe you. But I can't tell you. I think I'd like to
trust you. Maybe you'd better come home with us and have dinner."
"Well, sure, but—what would your mother say to that?" Calvin asked.
"She'd be delighted. Mother's all right. She's not one of us. But she's all right."
"What about Meg?"
"Meg has it tough," Charles Wallace said. "She's not really one thing or the other."
"What do you mean, one of us?" Meg demanded. "What do you mean I'm not one thing or the
other?"
"Not now. Meg," Charles Wallace said. "Slowly. Ill tell you about it later." He looked at
Calvin, then seemed to make a quick decision. "Okay, let's take him to meet Mrs. Whatsit. If he's
not okay she’ll know." He started off on his short legs toward the dilapidated old house.
The haunted house was half in the shadows of the clump of elms in which it stood. The elms
were almost bare, now, and die ground around the house was yellow with damp leaves. The late
afternoon light had a greenish cast which the blank windows reflected in a sinister way. An
unhinged shutter thumped. Something else creaked. Meg did not wonder that the house had a
reputation for being haunted.
A board was nailed across the front door, but Charles Wallace led the way around to the back.
The door there appeared to be nailed shut, too, but Charles Wallace knocked, and the door swung
slowly outward, creaking on rusty hinges. Up in one of the elms an old black crow gave its raucous
cry, and a woodpecker went into a wild ratatattat. A large gray rat scuttled around the comer of
the house and Meg let out a stifled shriek.
"They get a lot of fun out of using all the typical props," Charles Wallace said in a
reassuring voice. "Come on. Follow me."
Calvin put a strong hand to Meg's elbow, and Fort pressed against her leg. Happiness at their
concern was so strong in her that her panic fled, and she followed Charles Wallace into the dark
recesses of the house without fear.
They entered into a sort of kitchen. There was a huge fireplace with a big black pot hanging
over a merry fire. Why had there been no smoke visible from the chimney? Something in the pot was
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